Robbie Williams has opened up about his drug use at the height of his pop star career.
The singer, 50, appeared on KIIS FM’s Kyle and Jackie O Show on Wednesday to talk about his new biopic, Better Man, in which he is played by a CGI monkey.
In the film, Robbie chronicles a fictional version of his life, tracing his epic journey to stardom from boy band heartthrob to stadium rocker.
The musical explores Robbie’s harrowing struggle with substance use and shows him using drugs resembling cocaine and heroin before entering rehab.
With some elements of the film fictionalized, viewers were left wondering if Robbie actually used heroin and cocaine during his battle with drug addiction.
Sydney radio host Jackie ‘O’ Henderson grilled Robbie during a wide-ranging chat on her radio show, and the Angels hitmaker revealed that he did, in fact, take heroin.
Robbie Williams (pictured) opened up about his drug use at the peak of his career while promoting his new biopic Better Man on a Sydney radio show.
He admitted that he was “lucky” to never have become addicted and explained that he was more drawn to stimulant drugs.
“Yes, yes, I did heroin, I did the drug,” he told hosts Jackie and Kyle Sandilands.
“But it wasn’t my kind of thing, I preferred stimulants to painkillers, so luckily I never got addicted to smack, but I tried.”
Robbie sought help for his drug addiction several times during the height of his fame, including when he entered rehab centers in 1995 and 2007.
Robbie added that sobriety is an ongoing process, but that he ultimately “loves” life and is able to enjoy other places instead of drugs.
“I think, you know, you can obviously never say I’m fixed.” But I’ve had the longest period of sobriety,” he shared.
‘Also, I think my brain is rewiring itself to a place where I now get joy from places I couldn’t get joy from.
‘And they say on the show, don’t leave before the miracle happens. I can tell you that the miracle has happened and is happening. And I love my life and my place in it.”
Robbie (pictured in 1993) struggled with substance abuse at the height of his pop star fame and revealed he used heroin among other drugs.
Robbie turned to drugs for “safety” after struggling in boy band Take That (all pictured 1993) and went to rehab on multiple occasions, including in 1995 and 2007.
In his new biopic, Robbie details the highs and lows of his career in the spotlight and tells how he turned to drugs for “safety” after struggling in boy band Take That.
“I was doing everything I could get my hands on: ecstasy, cocaine, drinking. I literally drink like a bottle of vodka a night before I go to rehearsals, so that happens every night,” he revealed in a 2023 Netflix documentary.
‘We are facing someone in free fall, addicted to cocaine and alcohol. It’s impossible to help myself, it’s impossible to stop.’
Robbie was chosen to join Nigel Martin-Smith’s Take That group in 1990, but felt his place within the band was never “secure” and was almost kicked out just a few months later.
“The early days of Take That were spent in rehearsals,” he recently shared in the BBC documentary Boybands Forever.
“I had no experience in dance and the routines were so complex that I had a hard time understanding the steps, which made me look lazy.”
‘This was put forward in an unfavorable way. Let’s just say that Nigel wasn’t very happy with my request.
“It won’t be hard to kick you out of the band and get someone else with dark hair from Stoke-On-Trent and call him Robbie,” is what I remember.
His new biopic Better Man sees Robbie played by a CGI monkey as he chronicles his epic journey to stardom from boy band heartthrob to stadium rocker.
‘It made me feel like my place within the band was never safe or guaranteed. They didn’t love me, they didn’t even want me and I was 16.’
Robbie was the youngest member of the band, alongside Gary Barlow, Mark Owen, Jason Orange and Howard Donald, and was in the group for five years until he went solo in 1995.
He also famously had a fight with bandmate Gary Barlow in the 1990s, which is documented in Better Man and Robbie insisted it was right to include it.
He said: “I love Gaz and we’ve healed a lot of things, but that’s the complicated part,” he said.
“But to facilitate the third act of our careers we have to talk about the past and in this film I think and talk like I did when I was 19 or 20 years old and that is difficult.
“And I feel guilty for causing Gaz pain and provoking a response he doesn’t want or need, but I think it’s incredibly important to tell my story, flaws and all.”
Robbie also confessed that Gary was unhappy with his portrayal in the film and even called the Let Me Entertain You singer to tell him.
“He said, ’cause he’s an adult and we’re adults and we’re not mad at each other, but he said, ‘I come off worse than Darth Vader in the first Star Wars,'” Robbie admitted.